


Close your eyes, my love, let me make you blind

by Dingsi



Category: The Sandman
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-09-03
Updated: 2006-09-03
Packaged: 2017-10-14 14:07:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/149998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dingsi/pseuds/Dingsi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>50 sentences about the Corinthian.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Close your eyes, my love, let me make you blind

_#01 - Fair Play_

One of the unwritten rules of the Dreaming: nightmares may hunt and hurt the Dreamers, but they must never kill them.

 

_#02 - Bones_

Dream gives him an angered look, and he gets a weird prickly feeling deep in his bones: as if they faintly echoed the pain of decomposing.

 

_#03 - Desire_

He had met Dream's sister-brother but briefly, and Desire had looked at him as if it didn't care for this Dark Mirror To Mankind schtick but could reflect _his_ secrets instead, maybe he'd like that? -- and although he wore his shades, he had to look away.

 

_#04 - Flower_

In some dreams, he is an object of desire, and he still remembers one occasion when they had been standing in a field of white roses, with rows of tiny teeth hidden amongst the petals.

 

_#05 - Hat Box_

Some people believe that memories were like the faded photographs you keep stashed away in an old hat box, or like a video tape, but he wouldn't agree -- in his case, it's a matter of heredity.

 

_#06 - Jump_

He's not the touchy-feely kind of guy, but he likes to _touch_ : pressing on their skin and muscles, timing cuts and caresses to find out what makes them moan, beg, shiver, scream, or jump.

 

_#07 - Mother_

Some words, like "mother" or "pity," were empty shells to him: how could you miss something you'd never had?

 

_#08 - Father_

Wanting to make his creator proud but also wanting to piss him off was a constant internal struggle, fueled by emotions he couldn't figure out.

 

_#09 - Saliva_

He could never quite get used to tongue-kissing, this messy and obtrusive affair that was by no means intimate enough.

 

_#10 - Kaleidoscope_

Yes, the usual dreams were more colourful, swirling and exciting and detailed, but he still regarded them as inferior because nightmares created stronger, more lasting emotions.

 

_#11 - Primary Colors_

Of course, they all tasted delicious, but he wondered why the color palette had to be so limited: brown, green and blue in abundance, but what about yellow and red, or lavender, or gold?

 

_#12 - Ideal_

He had always strived for something greater: Artist, Visionary, Free Man.

 

_#13 - Challenge_

People tend to stare at you in awe when you say "I have fought against a god and won", but Loki hadn't been that much of a challenge... if he was being honest, even the eyes had not tasted anything special.

 

_#14 - Scar_

He's been there when Morpheus had been scarred by the Furies, and sometimes he'd like to ask Dan-- ask Dream if he remembered the pain.

 

_#15 - Face_

It's not that he didn't appreciate a pretty face, but for someone who was made to see your inner darkness and mirror it right back at you that façade had only a relative value.

 

_#16 - Unzipped_

He unzipped the body bag and sighed in disappointment: the eyes had already filmed over.

 

_#17 - Comfort_

He keeps telling the raven to piss off and that he doesn't need him anyway, but deep inside he's grateful that Matthew is stubborn enough to come back every time.

 

_#18 - Homeland_

Many legends and rumours surround his habitat -- an upside-down pyramid made of nothing but glass -- but he prefers the story that it was some ancient gods' citadel that had fallen from the sky, something foreign and unknown that is not really a part of the Dreaming.

 

_#19 - Window_

He sees a tacky dreamcatcher hanging in the window corner and has to stifle a laugh.

 

_#20 - Try_

It gnawed at him that he wasn't able to create and destroy at will, like his master, but he could at least try to _end_ things, couldn't he?

 

_#21 - Black Cloud_

Sometimes he almost misses the way in which Morpheus had used the weather to indicate his moods; it's one of the things Dream never does.

 

_#22 - Call_

During his conversation with Nimrod, his voice was calm and polite, but when he hung up the phone he felt more than just a tad excited.

 

_#23 - Design_

Wasn't it deliciously twisted that he, the hunter, was designed just so he could blend in with his prey?

 

_#24 - Concentrate_

He pushes away a strand of feathery raven-black hair to get to the remaining eye, again looks at the kohl smudges contrasting with pale skin and for the second time tonight tries to block out irritating memories.

 

_#25 - Bite_

Some guys, especially when drunk, just couldn't keep their hands off the sunglasses which often cost them some fingers.

 

_#26 - Power_

If someone asked him, he'd say that true power meant being able to go where you wanted and to do as you pleased.

 

_#27 - Fingers_

He hated working with other nightmares -- once the Chalk Ghost had fucked up its script, bitten off the dreamer's leg and awoken him before the Corinthian could even lay a hand on the boy, and for that he had kicked it so hard that it retched back up some flesh.

 

_#28 - Damage_

The glass shards of his home rearrange themselves to undo the wormhole, leaving him with dozens of cuts and scratches but he does neither bleed nor make a sound: being exhausted and hungry, he thinks, is so much worse.

 

_#29 - Glue_

The bathroom was a mess, with dried blood glueing together hair and clothes and skin in many places... ah well, you couldn't be perfect from the start.

 

_#30 - Natural_

On his first day, he explained to Matthew the raven that he shouldn't be so freaked-out by his eye-eating habit -- after all, wasn't it natural behaviour for both of them?

 

_#31 - Respite_

He watched the staff deconstruct the scenery of tonight's dreams, including the bloody remnants of the fake bodies, and lit a cigarette.

 

_#32 - Disaster_

He already regretted that he had made Dream tell him all about the Cereal Convention; it was a tale about a ridiculous circle-jerk of idiots with a very uncomfortable ending, and he never, ever wanted to hear it again.

 

_#33 - Accuse_

People still held him responsible for the actions of his predecessor, and that he actually had some second-hand memories of events just made matters worse.

 

_#34 - Morning_

One morning -- and he had still been young, then, new-born for the second time -- he had awoken to the sound of softly crumbling dream-buildings and shifting sand, and for a heartbeat he was terrified his master could have gone, leaving them to wither in his absence.

 

_#35 - Haunted_

When he needs some fresh air, he often chooses the City of Empty Houses at the rim of Nightmare, a quiet place of decadent decay where the words "hunted" and "haunted" blurred like dried blood and corrosion, and in a room with bleached-out anatomical drawings pinned to the walls he sits down, sips his beer and broods ... that's how him and the Stitched Lady met.

 

_#36 - Wrong_

"No," he replied and finally showed him his triple grin, "this is not a dream."

 

_#37 - Note_

He never felt the urge to leave any messages behind, partly because the bodies were trademark enough, partly because he wasn't doing this for others.

 

_#38 - Go_

More and more often he found himself thinking about leaving the Dreaming altogether, and although the constant hunger was the most obvious reason, he knew it wasn't the only one.

 

_#39 - Upside Down_

There had to be something fundamentally wrong with the world when someone who you wanted to protect with your own life, the person you would have given your life for without even thinking twice, just... died.

 

_#40 - Keep Out_

He doesn't need a locked door to keep the other Dreaming inhabitants from entering his sanctuary: he's the kind of nightmare who scares off other nightmares.

 

_#41 - Sides_

He checks the ropes one last time, then lets his fingers tap slightly against the boy's sides, scratches patterns into his naked skin and listens to his sobs, mesmerized... for a while.

 

_#42 - Separation_

Even if he wasn't a Major Arcana, his experiences would still set him apart: only a handful of dreams knew about things like change and re-birth, or the huge difference between dream-taste and _real_ taste.

 

_#43 - Trail_

Oh, it's true, fear _does_ have a smell, just like dust or rotting dreams, and he could follow its sweetness anywhere.

 

_#44 - Liar_

He doesn't care for labels such as "cruel" or "sadist", but to be called a _liar_ irritates him -- they should know he's the exact opposite; he's an _unmasker_ of deceit, and if his victims were still alive they could confirm he'd never lied to them.

 

_#45 - Hour_

He closes the trunk and smiles: the convention will only take a couple hours, and now he can look forward to having a nice snack afterwards.

 

_#46 - Easy_

At first the thought of copycats had been flattering, but after following the news for a while he met them with contempt: they killed with ease, but lacked his style and artistry.

 

_#47 - Tie_

On his second mission, he had been determined to stay outside, never to return to the Dreaming, and he is certain he did indeed have a choice... so why had he come back again?

 

_#48 - Sense_

It took him just one visit to the Waking World to appreciate other senses besides the visual.

 

_#49 - Education_

His master never bothered to teach him anything, so he looked for his own way to educate himself, and eventually found it.

 

_#50 - Change_

He'd always thought that, of all beings in the world, Daniel ought to understand.

**Author's Note:**

> [Mild warnings] Disturbing images and allusions to gore and violence, but nothing graphic.
> 
> [Canon notes] Sentences cover some events from the _Sandman_ series, as well as its _Dreaming_ spin-off. I decided to use both incarnations of the Corinthian.* Other nightmares are original creations.
> 
> [Thanks] Katarik for betaing and the title, as well as being patient; Vermultitude and Richard for audiencing and encouragement.
> 
> [Other notes] Written for the [1character](http://community.livejournal.com/1character/) community on LJ (theme set Eta) and initially posted under lord_dingsi. Backdated to actual posting date. I edited a few sentences very slightly to eliminate errors or clumsy wordings that I didn't spot the first time around.  
> The title of the fic is from a hd lawrence poem called "Tease".
> 
> * There's a crosspost - the old, unedited version - [on IJ](http://das-dingsi.insanejournal.com/24616.html) in table form where you can highlight white text to see which one I thought of for a sentence.


End file.
